It takes both houses of Congress, the Senate and the House of Representatives, to pass a federal budget, or, a continuing resolution when they've failed to pass a budget, in order to keep the federal government running. Currently, the Democrats have the majority in the Senate and the Republicans have the majority in the House. Now throw the President into the mix.

Unfortunately they use the threat of a gov't shut-down (and the debt ceiling which is coming up next) to see which side will blink first. They didn't come to an agreement before time ran out so the shut-down began. Mike explained about essential and non-essential...

The problem for the American people is we have no immediate recourse (that I know of?) we can use to punish these bastards until they come up for re-election and they know it!

the problem is you vote our the dems in the senate and the reps in the house and they basically swap positions and you have the same problem (i am not stating this, i am asking) ...

would a viable third party be the answer? problem is i guess is who would they represent? (which political allegiance)